Non-contact High Voltage Measurements: Modeling and On-site Evaluation

Abstract: In the high voltage grid, voltage measurements are made in dedicated voltage-transformers. These devices are expensive and insulation failures could impact directly on the system, and even cause a power outage. A non-contact measurement technique, on the other hand, does not require a connection to the conductors, and the sensors can therefore be much cheaper by avoiding the need for high voltage insulation. A capacitive coupling between three measurement electrodes, close to ground, and a high voltage three phase conductor system is used to model and measure the electric field and thereby determine the potentials of the conductors. A 2D-model is used for simulations, where the sensors are modeled as ideal, the conductors are modeled in an infinite wire approximation, and the ground plane is approximated as a perfect conductor. For non-ideal sensors a transfer function from the potentials on the measurement equipment to the potentials on the conductors is derived as a lumped-circuit model. The L2-norm errors for the amplitude and the phase in the reconstructed signals are calculated and measured for various sensor distances. Simulations show that the sensor distance should not be larger than the conductor distance to mitigate the erroneous effects from distance uncertainties. The optimal sensor distance depends on the quota between the height from the sensors to the conductors and the conductor distance. Measurements show, in accordance with the theory, that the sensor distance should not be larger than the conductor distance. To reduce the amplitude and phase shift errors the sensors should be placed close to the ground. For applied load resistances there is a tradeoff between amplitude- and phase shift errors. Additionally, higher load resistances attenuate higher frequencies. Measurements have verified that this technique is capable of detecting high harmonics and transients. The relatively low cost and the movability makes this method highly applicable for quick diagnostics on many locations in a grid, where the data can be evaluated on-site using computer based scripts.